Church Markets Its Gospel with High-Pressure Sales

Behind the religious trappings, the Church of Scientology is
run like a lean, no-nonsense business in which potential members are
called "prospects," "raw meat" and "bodies in the shop."

Its governing financial policy, written by the late Scientology
founder L. Ron Hubbard, is simple and direct: "MAKE MONEY, MAKE MORE
MONEY, MAKE OTHERS PRODUCE SO AS TO MAKE MONEY."

The organization uses sophisticated sales tactics to sell a
seemingly endless progression of expensive courses, each serving as a
prerequisite for the next. Known collectively as "The Bridge," the
courses promise salvation, higher intelligence, superhuman powers and
even possible survival from nuclear fallout -- for those who can pay.

Church tenets mandate that parishioners purchase Scientology goods
and services under Hubbard's "doctrine of exchange." A person must
learn to give, he said, as well as receive.

For its programs and books, the church charges "fixed donations"
that range from $50 for an elementary course in improving
communication skills to more than $13,000 for Hubbard's secret
teachings on the origins of the universe and the genesis of mankind's
ills.

The church currently is offering a "limited time only" deal on a
select package of Hubbard courses, which represent a small portion of
The Bridge. If bought individually, those courses would cost
$55,455. The sale price: $33,399.50.

As a promotional flyer for the discount observes, "YOU SAVE
$22,055.50."

To complete Hubbard's progression of courses, a Scientologist could
conceivably spend a lifetime and more than $400,000. Although few if
any have doled out that much, the high cost of enlightenment in
Scientology has left many deeply in debt to family, friends and banks.

Ask former church member Marie Culloden of Manhattan Beach, who
describes herself as a "recovering Scientologist."

"I'm trying to recover my mortgaged home," says Culloden, who spent
20 years in Scientology and obtained three mortgages totaling more
than $80,000 to buy courses.

The Scientology Bridge is always under construction, keeping the
Supreme Answer one step away from church members -- a potent sales
strategy devised by Hubbard to keep the money flowing, critics
contend.

New courses continually are added, each of which is said to be
crucial for spiritual progress, each heavily promoted.

Church members are warned that unless they keep purchasing
Scientology services, misery and sickness may befall them. For the
true believer, this is a powerful incentive to keep buying whatever
the group is selling.

Through the mail, Scientologists are bombarded with glossy,
colorful brochures announcing the latest courses and
discounts. Letters and postcards sound the dire warning, "Urgent!
Urgent! Your future is at risk! ... It is time to ACT! NOW! ... You
must buy now!"

By far the most expensive service offered by Scientology is
"auditing" -- a kind of confessional during which an individual
reveals intimate and traumatic details of his life while his responses
are monitored on a lie detector-type device known as the E-meter.

The purpose is to unburden a person of painful experiences, or
"engrams," that block his spiritual growth, a process that can span
hundreds of hours. Auditing is purchased in 12 1/2-hour chunks costing
anywhere between $3,000 and $11,000 each, depending on where it is
bought.

Even Scientology's critics concede that auditing often helps people
feel better by allowing them to air troubling aspects of their lives
-- much like a Catholic confessional or psychotherapy -- and keeps
them coming back for more.

The church makes no apologies for the methods it uses to raise
funds and spread the gospel of its founder. Scientology spokesmen said
in interviews that it takes money to cover overhead expenses and to
finance the church's worldwide expansion, as it does for any religion.

"You can't do it on bread and butter," said one.

Church leaders will not discuss Scientology's gross income or net
worth. But they contend that Scientologists who pay for spiritual
programs are no different from, say, Mormons who tithe 10% of their
income for admittance to the temple, or from Jews who buy tickets to
High Holiday services or from Christians who rent church pews.

"The fact of the matter is that the parishioners of the Church of
Scientology have felt and continue to feel that they get full value
for their donations," said Scientology lawyer Earle C. Cooley.

Many Scientologists say that Hubbard's teachings have resurrected
their lives, some of which were marred by drugs, personal traumas,
self doubts or a sense of alienation. They say that, through the
church, they have gained confidence and learned to lead ethical lives
and take responsibility for themselves, while working to create a
better world.

Scientology "works," they say, and for that, no price is too high.

"It takes money," acknowledged Scientologist Sheri Scott. "It took
money for my father to buy his Cadillac. I wish he'd sell the damn
thing and give me the money (for Scientology).... I have never felt
cheated at all."

"I'm not glued to the sky or anything. I'm a very normal person,"
she added. "I just wish more people would take a look, would read
(about Scientology), before they decide we're cuckoo."

While other religions increasingly advertise and market themselves,
none approaches the Church of Scientology's commercial zeal and
sophistication.

Its tactics come directly from Hubbard, who wrote entire treatises
on how to create a market for, and sell, Scientology.

He borrowed generously from a 1971 book called "Big League Sales
Closing Techniques." Touted as the "selling secrets of a
supersalesman," the book was written by former car dealer Les Dane,
who has conducted popular seminars at Scientology headquarters in
Florida.

Hubbard said Scientology must be marketed through the "art of hard
sell," meaning an "insistence that people buy." He said that,
"regardless of who the person is or what he is, the motto is, 'Always
sell something....' "

Hubbard contended that such high-pressure tactics are imperative
because a person's spiritual well being is at stake.

Among other things, he directed his followers to: "rob the person
of every opportunity to say 'No.' "; "help prospects work through
financial stops impeding a sale"; "make the prospect think it was his
idea to make the purchase"; utilize the two man "tag team" approach,
and "overcome and rapidly handle any attempted prospect backout."

One of the most important techniques in selling Scientology,
Hubbard said, is to create mystery.

"If we tell him there is something to know and don't tell him what
it is, we will zip people into" the organization, Hubbard wrote. "And
one can keep doing this to a person -- shuttle them along using
mystery."

Frequently, a person's first contact with Scientology comes when he
is approached by a staff member on the street and offered a free
personality test, or receives a lengthy questionnaire in the mail.

Using charts and graphs, the idea is to convince a person that he
has some problem, or "ruin," that Scientology can fix, while assuaging
concerns he may have about the church. According to Hubbard, "if the
job has been done well, the person should be worried."

With that accomplished, the customer is pushed to buy services he
is told will improve his sorry condition and perhaps give him such
powers as being able to spiritually travel outside his body -- or, in
Scientology jargon, to "exteriorize."

Former church member Andrew Lesco said he was told that he "would
be able to project my mind into drawers, someone's pocket, a wallet
and I would be able to tell what's inside ... "

Church members are required to write testimonials -- "success
stories" -- as they progress from one level to the next.

The testimonials regularly appear in Scientology
publications. Usually carrying only the authors' initials, they are
used to promote courses without the church itself assuming legal
liability for promising results that may not occur, according to
ex-Scientologists. Here is an example:

"We were having trouble with the windshield wipers in our car.
Sometimes they would work and sometimes they wouldn't.... We were
driving along, and my husband was driving. I got to thinking about the
windshield wipers, left my body in the seat and took a look under the
hood. I spotted the wires that were shorting and caused them to weld
themselves together, like they were supposed to be. We haven't had any
trouble with them since."

Scientology staffers who sell Hubbard's courses are called
"registrars." They earn commissions on their sales and are skilled at
eliciting every facet of an individual's finances, including bank
accounts, stocks, cars, houses, whatever can be converted to cash.

Like all Scientology staffers, a registrar's productivity is
evaluated each week. Performance is judged by how much money he or she
brings in by Thursday afternoon. And, in Scientology, declining or
stagnant productivity is not viewed benevolently, as former registrar
Roger Barnes says he learned.

"I remember being dragged across a desk by my tie because I hadn't
made my (sales quota)," said Barnes, who once toured the world selling
Scientology until he had a bitter break with the group.

Barnes and other ex-Scientologists say that this uncompromising
push to generate more money each week places intense pressure on
registrars.

Another former Scientology salesman in Los Angeles said he and
other registrars would use a tactic called "crush regging." The
technique, he said, employed no elaborate sales talk. They repeated
three words again and again: "Sign the check. Sign the check."

"This made the person feel so harassed," he said, "that he would
sign the check because it was the only way he was going to get out of
there."

A 1984 investigative report by Canadian authorities quoted a
Toronto registrar as saying that members of the public want to be
"bled of their money.... If they didn't, they would be staff members
eligible for free training."

The Canadian report also recounted a meeting during which
Scientology staffers chanted: "Go for the throat. Go for blood. Go for
the bloody throat."

Former Scientologist Donna Day of Ventura said that church
registrars accused her of throwing away money on rent and on food for
her cats and dogs -- "degraded beings," they called her pets. They
said the money should be going to the church.

"I was so upset, I finally left the house with them sitting in it,"
said Day, who sued the church to get back $25,000 she said she had
spent on Scientology.

Several years ago, church members persuaded a Florida woman to turn
over a workers compensation settlement she received after the death of
her husband, Larry M. Wheaton, who left behind two children, ages 3
and 7. He was the pilot of an Air Florida jet that plunged into the
Potomac River after it had departed Washington, D.C.'s National
Airport in 1982.

The Wheatons were longtime church members.

Joanne Wheaton gave nearly $150,000 to the church and almost as
much to a private business controlled by Scientologists. But the deal
was blocked when a lawsuit was brought by an attorney appointed by the
court to protect the children's interests.

The suit claimed that the Scientologists had disregarded the future
welfare and financial security of the Wheaton family by taking money
that was supposed to be used solely for the support of the children
and their mother.

After protracted discussions, the money was refunded and the
Scientologists who negotiated the deal were expelled by the church for
their role in the affair.

For years, one of Scientology's top promoters was Larry
Wollersheim. He traveled the country inspiring others to follow him
across Hubbard's Bridge. Then he became disenchanted with the
movement.

In 1980, he filed a Los Angeles Superior Court lawsuit, accusing
the church of subjecting him to psychologically damaging practices and
of driving him to the brink of insanity and financial ruin after he
had a falling out with the group.

Three years ago, a jury awarded him $30 million. The award was
recently reduced to $2.5 million.

During the litigation, Wollersheim filed a 200-page affidavit in
which he offered this analysis of what keeps Scientologists hooked:

"Fear and hope are totally indoctrinated into the cult
(Scientology) member. He hopes that he will receive the miraculous and
ridiculous claims made directly, indirectly and by rumor by the sect
and its members.

"He is afraid of the peer pressure for not proceeding up the
prescribed program. He is intimidated and afraid of being accused of
being a dilettante. He is afraid that if he doesn't do it now before
the world ends or collapses he may never get the chance. He is afraid
if he doesn't claim he received gains and write a success testimonial
he will be shunned....

"How many people could stand up to that kind of pressure and stand
before a group of applauding people and say: 'Hey, it really wasn't
good.'?"

Wollersheim said that the courses provide only a temporary
euphoria.

"Then you're sold the next mystery and the next solution.... I've
seen people sell their homes, stocks, inheritances and everything they
own chasing their hopes for a fleeting, subjective euphoria. I have
never witnessed a greater preying on the hopes and fears of others
that has been carefully engineered by the cult's leader."

PHOTO: A "free personality test," offered here at the Scientology
complex in Hollywood, often constitutes a person's introduction to the
church.
PHOTOGRAPHER: LARRY DAVIS / Los Angeles Times
PHOTO: The E-meter, used to monitor responses during "auditing."
PHOTOGRAPHER: Los Angeles Times

Copyright (c) 1990 Times Mirror Company
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